The below is an email I received from Marc Jones, the Police & Crime Commissioner for Lincolnshire containing his Annual Report.
As we enter the home straight of 2020, I wanted to write to you to acknowledge and offer thanks for
the support I have received from you during this challenging year.
In common with most of the UK, this Covid-19 ravaged year has provided no shortage of challenges
for me and my office as we continue our efforts to keep our communities safe.
I thought it would be helpful to provide you with an update on the milestones reached and the
successes achieved by the Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner over the last 12 months.
Earlier this year I promised that the continued financial support of Lincolnshire taxpayers would be
invested in new services, technology and vehicles to help on the fight to keep our communities safe.
All the projects the Chief Constable and I identified were designed to work together in enhancing the
ability to track, trace and hunt down criminals but with a special focus on reducing violence and
tackling drug traffickers and dealers as they attempt to bring illegal substances on to our streets.
Now I am proud to say all those pledges are being realised with an enhanced dog unit trained to
detect drugs, cash, electronic digital devices and firearms; 24-hour county-wide drone coverage and
new faster and better equipped pursuit vehicles.
These steps, in conjunction with the largest recruitment drive seen in years - 120 Officers this year
alone - are crucial steps towards the goals I set when I was elected as Police and Crime
Commissioner, key of which is to prevent and tackle crime.
I set out to build a Force equipped with the right tools, the latest technology, and the leadership
necessary to make Lincolnshire one of the safest places in the UK to live and work and I remain
committed to that aim.
Other achievements include:
• Securing £250,000 through the Safer Streets Fund to spend on extending and enhancing the
CCTV provision in Gainsborough using the latest Artificial Intelligence to protect the public and
tackle crime.
• Establishment of a ‘Safer Together’ Team comprising one Team Lead and four co-ordinators, to
cover Boston and South Holland, East Lindsey, North and South Kesteven, and Lincoln and
West Lindsey.
This small team will work alongside the Neighbourhood Policing teams to enhance further
community resilience and engagement opportunities, identify local issues and seek local
solutions whilst ensuring I am sighted on local issues and concerns.
• Work is progressing on the Lincolnshire Substance Misuse Strategy. A multi-agency group has
been established and analysts are working to identify the level of demand. The intention is to
have an agreed strategy in place in early 2021 and then move to the delivery, planning and
commissioning phases. The harm caused by the illegal trade in drugs and the misuse of alcohol
cannot be overstated and I am determined to place Lincolnshire on the front foot in tackling this
problem.
• I have launched the Lincolnshire Youth Commission on Police, Crime and Community Safety.
The Youth Commission will establish a sustainable, structured system for young people aged
14-25 to influence decisions about policing and crime in Lincolnshire. It presents a really exciting
and very valuable opportunity to hear the voices of our younger people who are
disproportionately victims of crime and are often not heard by the system.
• You will be aware that I have the duty to commission services for victims of crime across the
county. We have developed what I believe to be the very best victims website
(www.victimlincs.co.uk) along with a new Facebook page to enable people to find all relevant
information at the very moment they need it . I have also commissioned a needs assessment for
survivors of sexual abuse and, in addition, secured £139,210.80 from the Ministry of Justice
(MoJ) through the COVID-19 Emergency Grant Funding for additional support regarding
domestic abuse and sexual violence services.
• Thanks to a successful bid to the National Lottery Community Fund, money has been made
available to continue our domestic abuse early intervention and response project, “Make a
Change” in Lincolnshire for a further three years which is excellent news. Preventing
perpetrators of these crimes from continuing their behaviour will prevent victims of these
abhorrent crimes.
• I have been successful in an application to the Government for a special grant of £884,000 to
further tackle crime across the country which will be put to very good use in our communities.
• Our pilot to use sobriety tags to tackle alcohol abuse was so successful that the scheme was
rolled out across the UK. More than 100 offenders were issued with the tag and 97.4% of all the
days monitored were free of alcohol. This will be a game changer in tackling alcohol related
crimes from drink driving to alcohol fuelled violence, and it is work I am exceptionally proud that
Lincolnshire have been leading on.
• The huge improvements in the firearms licensing process via a ground-breaking online portal,
spearheaded by my office, has now been recognised nationally. Every year the British
Association for Shooting and Conservation (BASC) creates a league table to grade the speed at
which forces deal with licenses. This year BASC rated Lincolnshire Police as in the top three for
dealing with certificate grants and renewals – catapulted from the bottom of the league two years
ago. There are 20,000 firearms licence holders in Lincolnshire lawfully holding 50,000 firearms.
The responsibility to keep the owners of those firearms and the wider public safe is a huge one
that the reforms locally have transformed.
• Lincolnshire Police were provided with 170 new tasers after a successful bid by my office for
£140,000 from the Home Office. The grant was the sixth highest amount for a police force in
England, outside of London and will more than double the number of frontline taser trained
Officers to circa 350.
• I committed £34,000 to support and expand Community Payback – a scheme which requires
offenders to pay back the community for the crimes they have committed with unpaid work. In
Lincolnshire around 80% of those who take part in the programme do not reoffend within the first
12 months, so it really does work. It is believed to be a UK first for a PCC to commission criminal
justice interventions in this way.
All these successes have been achieved in the months following the publication of my Annual
Report (attached) which itself outlines a wealth of accomplishments by the OPCC in the previous
12 months.
The tremendous support from partner organisations, MPs, local, regional and national agencies and
the staff in my office has made all this possible.
I am honoured to represent Lincolnshire and proud to be able to outline the important work being done to keep our communities safe.
If you have any questions or require more details on any of the projects outlined in this letter or in the Annual Report, please do not hesitate to contact me.
Yours sincerely
Marc Jones
Police and Crime Commissioner for Lincolnshire
